Turn! Turn! Turn!
by magpieforjoy
Summary: Summary: Ted is about to meet the love of his life, but what came before this moment is just as important. Ted/Mother, Barney/Robin, Marshall/Lily, and many others along the way.


**Beta:** The amazing, incredible, supermegafoxyawesomehot **girlthethird**  
**Author's note:** So **msmanuscript** made a prompt request a billion years ago at **himym_ficprompt**, to use Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 as inspiration. I wrote a bit here and a bit there for the next year and a half, and then there was a SIGN. I mean, a real sign: in "Big Days," the church's marquee displayed the first verse. And here we are!  
**Author's note part 2:** This fic is not about religion. In case you were wondering.  
**Author's note part 3:** The Byrd's famous cover of Pete Seeger's song, "Turn! Turn! Turn!", which uses Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 as lyrics, is worth a listen.

* * *

**Prologue: To Every Thing There Is a Season**  
_a little ways down the road..._

If anyone ever asks him to be their best man again, Ted needs Lily to make him remember this moment before allowing him to respond. Sure, he's experienced some pretty memorable wedding disasters in the past, but this one really takes the over-decorated, three-tiered cake. If he'd had the foresight to bring a video camera, he knows at the very least he'd be able to have evidence of likely the most epic nuptial freakout he's ever had the displeasure of witnessing, but alas, he's no Robin Scherbatsky in the preparedness department.

In the midst of these at once terrifying and entertaining hysterics, Ted thinks he hears a rapping at the door, but before he can react, Lily is already sprinting to the entrance, obviously as eager as he to have some distraction. Cindy's head cautiously appears around the door. "Um," she apprehensively takes in the scene, "Can I talk to Ted for a sec?"

Lily's shoulders slump, and Ted would punch the air in victory if he wasn't sure he'd be in danger of one of her "dead to me" glares in response.

"Don't worry," he says, trying to look more supportive than eager to be gone. "I'm sure..." he waves his hand aimlessly, "... _that_ will calm down soon anyway."

Lily still looks a little murderous, and Ted can almost feel the winds of impending doom gathering, so he hastily adds: "And I'll see if Marshall can be spared to help out here too - be right back!" He high-tails it out of there before Lily can make him stay, but not before she calls out, "Fine, but you're going to owe me, like, five beers for this!"

Ted ushers Cindy further down the hallway to put some distance between them and that pit of chaos. Once stopped, he looks at her anxiously. "Is everything okay? Did she decide not to -"

"No, she's here, it's all good," Cindy interrupts him. "It's just... are you sure you want to go through with this? You know, I could just talk you up to her, no big deal, and you wouldn't have to do this huge thing. I mean, don't you think that's going to take away from the bride and groom? Don't they have a problem with this?"

Nervousness rises up in him, but Ted pushes it down and forces out a laugh. "No, they actually both think it's hilarious. They're, like, my biggest co-conspirators in this whole mess." He glances back at the room he's just escaped. "Well, when they're not freaking out about the main event."

Cindy grins. "Don't worry too much about them. It's the worst right before, and I know I was kind of hellish at the time, but once you get to the actual ceremony? All the stuff that seemed to really matter and signify the End of the World suddenly disappears. Those two will be alright, I can tell."

Ted squares his shoulders, looking at the earnest expression on her face. He lets out a long breath. "Okay... okay."

Her grin widens. "Not every day the best man needs to be talked down, but considering the circumstances... I guess it was going to happen sooner or later. I mean, how many times have you done this now?" Ted shrugs, and she pats him on the arm reassuringly. "Hey, so she'll be sitting with me - we've got seats more towards the back on the left side, if you happen to look around during the ceremony. Otherwise, we'll see you at the reception, okay?"

Ted must look a bit overwhelmed, and maybe a little sick too, because Cindy's smile falters. "You know what? I think Lily can handle a couple more minutes on her own. Why don't you get some fresh air for a minute, and I'll grab Marshall for you instead?"

Ted nods weakly, and after she nudges him out the door into the bright June sunshine, he can hear the click clack of her heels growing more distant until the door shuts fully behind him. He wanders over to the shady center of the courtyard and, sinking onto the cool wooden bench, considers the situation before him.

He knows _exactly_ how lucky he is that the bride didn't punch him when, at the last minute, he'd asked to change his "plus one" to a "plus two." He's seen first-hand what can happen to a normally level-headed person when saddled with planning a wedding, no matter the length of the engagement. Heather, Claudia, Lily, Stella... even James got a bit hysterical just before the ceremony. But once Ted explained just what he planned to do with that second invitation, going into absurdly intricate detail what he'd been planning since he had that brainwave the night before - an idea that, if properly executed, would put all past romantic gestures to shame - the murderous rage had gone out of the bride-to-be's eyes, and her expression softened. Ted knew of all people, she would truly appreciate this.

"Now that's more like it," she'd smiled warmly. "I hope you know what you're doing, Teddy."

Ted certainly hopes so, too. He doesn't know if he has it in him to pull anything like this off again if it backfires. What he does know is that if Barney were to take one look at him right now, he'd tell him to quit Tedding Out about it. Ted squares his shoulders and resolves to think of something else while he has a last few minutes of blessed peace before leaping back into the fray.

A few pieces of his speech are still bugging him - one in particular where he says something self-deprecating is especially bothersome (though there is certainly more than one problem area, what with the trouble he had writing it, considering the bride and groom's circumstances). He wants to say something along the lines of "Always a bridesmaid, never the bride" and though he's sure Barney would be able to complete his half-baked twist "Always a wingman, never the [blank]," Ted knows he isn't exactly going to help out with something as monumentally unimportant as a speech right now. Robin would roll her eyes; Marshall would point out that such a statement is patently untrue, as far as Ted's track record of long-term relationships goes; and Lily would give him that all too sympathetic look Ted has noticed more often since the rest of the group paired off in their own, still admittedly surprising ways, which has had the unintended effect of making Ted's situation seem even more pronounced.

Ted had thought he'd had a hard time putting together a toast for Marshall and Lily, but that was because he knew far more about their relationship than any best friend should have to, which resulted in a case of information overload when he tried to process that knowledge to create a fitting tribute to them. At eighteen, he'd been scarred for life being on the scene for one of their many firsts, and their friendship had continued from then on in the same spirit of "way too much information."

The couple he has to toast now is as far from that as it is possible to be. "It's just not our thing," they'd explained long ago, and Ted understands that all too easily. He's witnessed and finally come to terms with the fact that a relationship with no secrets works only in very rare occasions, and to try to push that onto people who don't _want_ to handle every single detail being dissected and recorded at the end of each day... well, that apparently ends not with a bang (had to) but with a whimper.

Ted wonders if the bride and groom will heckle him if he goes with the architecture metaphor he's been concocting while considering the differences between those relationships. Lily and Marshall built their foundation of what love is supposed to be around each other - they have known nothing else. Most couples, however, have to make many beginnings, with errant wrecking balls demolishing what had seemed to be sturdy beams. It's foolish to attempt a relationship that at surface level looks like Lily and Marshall's when it is really founded on buried and broken remains of past relationships that had not been properly sanded and bricked over. And so that kind of relationship joins the rest when it crumbles... until they step back, stop trying to build something that doesn't fit over the jagged ruins of their pasts, and pause to take a look at the design. It is only then that they can repair the bedrock and begin to merge the foundations into something functional and new.

He shakes his head. Nah, they'll just make fun of him at every opportunity for the rest of his life... probably resurrect it at his own wedding - if he ever gets there. He's glad Cindy kept her promise, but knowing that his One might be here after all this time... Well, it's enough to make anyone anxious, let alone someone who is as hyper-aware of his own destiny as Ted is. Only a few days ago he'd realized how true that is - how many times he might have met this woman whom he is now convinced has got to be perfect for him. When Cindy finally revealed the name of her ex-roommate, and he'd realized that he could have met her years ago... but, he knows, it wasn't the right timing. Every time he might have met her, he hadn't been prepared, and it's just as well, he thinks. Now, he _is_ prepared. He has a plan, he isn't in love with Robin (laughable), he isn't dating Cindy (even more laughable), she isn't anywhere close to being a student of his, he's suited up, and he's _ready_. He thought he was ready when he met Robin, but he had been dead wrong. She just started him on this odyssey. He had to go through theft of decorative musical instruments, matchmakers, re-returns, a rain dance, a tattoo, a failed wedding, a movie making fun of him, a murderous ex-husband, and many more trials before he could get to where he is now. It's all been a journey leading him to this day, this wedding, _this moment_.

In a minute, someone is going to come to haul him back into the chaos inside the church, and while he's still nervous as all get out, for now, this he knows:

This is his season. This is his time.


End file.
